Tag Archives: Shetland Seas Shawl

This weekend, I finished the fourth of four Preemie Hats for Jeanne and Chelle’s K3tog Preemie Hat Extravaganza (yes, a little late: the story of my life, and I blame the altered mental state induced by the Shetland Seas Shawl (please do follow the link and see the big reveal if you haven’t already!).

The big cat was not amused.

“I can’t believe it’s that time again already. Where’s that kitten? Isn’t it her turn?”

Don’t worry, all hats were washed and no cats were harmed, other than dignity, during the course of this post.

Here are three hats: the fourth was finished after prime daylight hours.

my folks stopped by yesterday afternoon to drop something off on their way somewhere, and I dragooned my father into taking a couple quick shots of the shawl outside, in working shawl position. (I was all ready, as I wore it to church that morning.) So here it is, in the wild.

And later I went to try to experiment with standing on a stool in our upstairs bathroom. With rather amusing results, at least I was thinking so at the time.

When we left our shawl-in-blocking yesterday, it was in use by a certain feline:

“Do you think this shawl matches my eyes?”

She consented to assist with close-up photography, sitting on my shoulder to get a good view of the shots I was framing.

Macro shots of the beaded points.

Artsy shots of the color changes fading in the distance.

Stitch pattern details.

The obligatory blocking shot.

(The obligatory preblocking shot just didn’t turn out well, given poor lighting.)

Out to the porch for a few more photos. Here’s the center of the shawl, artsy again.

The whole shawl, hanging out.

And, since Beya couldn’t operate the camera and my RockStar model is away for the weekend, this is the best I could do for a modeled shot. I’ll see if I can get a RockStar or Gothlet pic, or get someone else to take a photo soon so you can see a shawl rather than a headscarf.

Don’t I look pleased with myself, though?

Well, a little smugness can surely be excused in a good cause, right?

Because I truly am delighted with my Shetland Seas Shawl!

I do have some notes about its making, which are here on Ravelry, and which I can put up in a future blog post if desired. But right now, I just want to continue to bask in its lovely blue-green shading. Happy sigh.

(Lagoon being the colorway name. No, I didn’t see the movie “The Blue Lagoon“, but I certainly remember all the hype about it. The shawl is innocently seductive in its own way, but otherwise has little in common with the movie, I’m thinking!)

I’m in the middle of the edging chart, and last night made my decision about These.

Beads are not part of the original design (not being a big Authentic Shetland knitting feature, as you might guess). But I thought they would complement the lustrous merino/bamboo yarn and beautiful blue edge and ‘sea’ theme.

My local bead shop has stopped carrying almost all 6-0 seed beads (the usual size appropriate for fingering weight yarn) except for a few beads aimed at kids. So I usually buy them online these days. When Mystery Stole 3 came out, one of the recommendations for bead purchases in the MS3 Yahoo group, was an eBay seller who has an eBay store, Emilia Beadelia’s Bead Shop. If you find yourself needing additional bead resources beyond what you can find locally, I would recommend this seller without hesitation. I’ve bought from her multiple times since then, and her selection of high quality beads at good prices is fantastic, shipping is reasonable and fast, and service is great.

Only problem is too many to choose from!

So, above, actually two are too small, though I could get them on (I had a brain fart and ordered 8-0 first, which is more a laceweight bead). The real choice was between the larger (6-0) icier blue or the blue-green (copper-lined) bead. (Both of these have a frosted finish that reminds me of beach glass. I had also gotten beads that are shiny, but I liked this finish a lot.) The bluer blue is the obvious match to the yarn at the end of the skein; but I ended up choosing the greener blue because I felt it harmonized all the colors of the shawl a bit.

(The color of both these pics is a little dubious; they were taken under indoor light without flash, since flash completely washes out this lustrous yarn.)

A few Ravelry projects of Shetland Triangle have used ad hoc beads, but none in the way I’m going to, that I saw. I’m going to use the designer Evelyn Clark’s own method as described in her book “Knitting Lace Triangles” (well, a slight adaptation of it) to nestle 3 beads in each point. That’s the plan, anyway!

We’ll see if I get to beads today (which would be the row before casting off) — it’s quite possible. There is this thing called work which comes first, however….

Not my usual Eye Candy, but I think knitters and others may appreciate it.

This incredibly dreamy yarn, which arrived a week ago in the mail, has been intermittently seducing me away from some of my other projects:

Yes, surprise, it’s Twisted: a newer dyeing ‘invention’ of Meg’s called Evolutions, which is a very gradual color shift from beginning to end of one skein. I’ve been trying for another Evolution skein (besides the Buxom that came with the Big Needle Club) for a couple updates now, and got lucky this time. This is in the Lagoon colorway, which is fairly new (and which I love), and in the Kabam! base, a smooth, soft, lustrous merino/bamboo/nylon fingering weight yarn. I’ve knit Kabam for socks and baby garments, but never for lace, and wow, is it wonderful in how it catches the light! Especially in the Fir Cone stitch pattern used in the Shetland Triangle Shawl (Ravelry link, or here’s Wendy’s) (from the book, “Wrap Style“.

Which is exactly what this is.

Though the sinuous swells here, especially in this colorway, remind me of shells or ripples rather than cones. Along with the colorway being called Lagoon, that’s why I’m calling this my Shetland Seas Shawl (at least for now).

I deliberately chose to knit this lace at not too overly airy a gauge, because I wanted the emphasis to be on the stockinette swirls rather than the ‘holes’; and also because, with the nature of the yarn, I’ll be knitting to the end of the skein, thus a fair number more repeats than the original pattern called for, I’m sure — so wanted a shawl that was not gigantor. One can always block a bit (or a fair amount) bigger, but not smaller! I was astounded at how easy this particular lace pattern is to knit; it’s almost (but not completely) mindless knitting (which is one reason it’s getting knit on; my two projects requiring chart knitting are languishing, because that kind of protected, mindful knitting time just hasn’t happened for, um, months….) Normally, then, I would have been a little bored by now, with the simple repetitive stitch pattern, given that I’m knitting it bigger than written (I’d be two rows away from the edging if I were knitting it as written). But the very gradual color change is keeping me quite engaged knitting, just to see it continue to progress! Right now, I’ve progressed from the original pale muted green to a rich medium green which is just starting to darken further.

Tomorrow, plans are for a road trip with knitting friends to a city I haven’t visited since I was 18, and a yarn shop that I’ve never been to! Driving time should be shared, so I expect to make some progress. I wonder if I could be starting to knit blue waves soon?